After Transmigrating into a Book, I Became Partners with My Mortal Enemy - Chapter 12 

Ding Xiandi’s acting was a bit much. You Fuling remained indifferent, but the surrounding disciples were howling and hollering in excitement.

In the eyes of the onlookers, the sword cultivator from the derelict sect looked deeply in love, fitting the internal rumors that the two had made a private lifelong commitment.

Ji Ting had been grumbling incessantly lately, claiming she had failed her Master’s teachings by allowing her junior sister’s reputation to be dragged through the mud within the Academy.

The moment Ding Xiandi finished her sentence, the reach-her-limit Ji Ting was about to strike. However, You Fuling caught her sleeve. The girl called out “Senior Sister” softly, while Ding Xiandi continued to watch her, eyes crinkled with a smile that looked somewhat reckless.

Even if her current shell wasn’t as beautiful as her previous one, she still carried that cunning air of someone accustomed to wearing a mask.

You Fuling had never had friends, but her mother had introduced her to candidates deemed “suitable.” When a group of children around the same age gathered to chat, they would inevitably mention the spotlight-stealing Ding Xiandi.

Where there is praise, there is resentment. Some said she did everything with too much fanfare; elders always used her as a benchmark. After venting, they would look at the silent You Fuling. The little girl’s face was always pale; even with lip balm, her lips lacked color.

Her mother had put every effort into dressing her up, hoping she would make friends, but forgot that her daughter was naturally reclusive and had no idea how to carry a conversation. She was like moss avoiding the morning sun, covered in damp, hidden thoughts.

“I remember You Fuling scored higher than Ding Xiandi on the last competition exam.” “I was there that day. Ding Xiandi got scolded by her dad. He’s so scary.” “Her mom is scary too, but she was fighting with the dad. I heard…”

You Fuling’s impression of Ding Xiandi was pieced together from fragments; everything she saw with her own eyes was how the other interacted with people. The girl was like a flickering reflection of sunlight in a pond—bright, but diminished. No one knew what the real sun looked like; they only knew that if you got too close, you’d get burned or melt.

Everyone could see Ji Ting was dissatisfied with Ding Xiandi and was willing to risk being sanctioned by the Law Enforcement Cranes to attack her.

You Fuling’s intervention only confirmed her “affection” for Ding Xiandi. No one paid attention to the dragged-away Juan Yuanjia anymore, and no one noticed that Ming Jing had left. Upstairs, only a music cultivator remained, squinting at the sword cultivator with the copper-patterned hairband.

The Tianji Academy wasn’t exactly a den of thieves, but it housed various sects and clans from all over Liuguang. Rogue cultivators didn’t participate in the underlying power struggles, but that didn’t stop them from enjoying the drama.

Ding Xiandi couldn’t feel those gazes. You Fuling raised her eyes slightly, then turned to the head-tilting Ding Xiandi and said, “I refuse.”

Ji Ting nearly moved to tears, while the crowd erupted in boos. Mei Chi continued eating her cakes; it seemed even her Second Senior Sister being rejected couldn’t stop her from filling her stomach.

Perhaps the crumbs attracted a crane. A gust of wind swirled, and soon a crane large enough to swallow a person landed exactly where Ji Ting was standing. Its talons hooked onto Ji Ting’s shoulders, making it look as though it were riding her.

A sword cultivator whose cultivation was top-tier among her peers was pressed down so suddenly she nearly collapsed. You Fuling reached out to steady her.

A white crane with a sesame flatbread hanging around its neck stood in Ji Ting’s original spot. Many people stood up in shock; some newcomers even thought it was an evil spirit.

“Aren’t cranes supposed to be slender? How can one be this massive! This is a demon!” “What demon! Haven’t you seen the footage of it fighting the Law Enforcement Cranes?” “This is the Eldest Senior Sister of the Star Point Sect!” “No wonder she’s the Eldest Senior Sister. She’s huge.” “Don’t you know this bird can command the Academy’s Law Enforcement Cranes? Her cultivation must be past the Golden Core stage.” “Does the sect rank seniority by strength? That doesn’t make sense. If so, Ding Xiandi’s cultivation is so low, why is she the second-in-command?”

Mei Chi stopped eating and lunged at the crane. She buried her face in the snowy white down, and her usually booming voice softened as she called out “Eldest Senior Sister,” nearly making Ding Xiandi faint from shock.

She had accepted that the sect leader was a crane, but she didn’t expect it to be so large that it would need two seats on a bus.

Ji Ting, supported by You Fuling, felt an immense weight on her shoulders. This crane was massive, weighing even more than the heavily armored Law Enforcement Cranes.

Ding Xiandi, who had prepared for two scenarios, wasn’t disappointed by You Fuling’s rejection. Seeing Mei Chi looking so happy buried in the feathers, she couldn’t help but reach out to touch them. Before her hand could make contact, the Eldest Senior Sister’s beak snapped against the back of her hand.

The sharp pain made her hiss. She stared at her hand, which had swollen like a steamed bun, and asked Mei Chi, “Why won’t Eldest Senior Sister let me touch her?”

Mei Chi adjusted the flatbread on the crane’s neck so the big bird could reach it by tilting its head. She returned to her normal tone: “Second Senior Sister, you asked Eldest Senior Sister to deliver your love letters but didn’t pay her.”

How was Ding Xiandi supposed to know that?

Mei Chi had no filter and didn’t care about the setting. Laughter broke out around them, all directed at Ding Xiandi’s previous feelings for Ming Jing. Some also looked at You Fuling, who was still supporting her own Senior Sister, speculating whether this genius and Ding Xiandi were truly committed to each other.

The original owner was dirt poor, and the non-human Senior Sister clearly had a massive appetite. It was said that as soon as she entered the Academy, she fought the Law Enforcement Cranes until the sky was filled with feathers and heavy metal plumes. The metal feathers had injured many new disciples. Later, she successfully joined the enforcement squad; with plenty to eat and drink, she lived a much better life than her junior sisters in the sect.

“Is that so?” Ding Xiandi asked. She looked up and met You Fuling’s scrutinizing gaze behind the veil. Ding Xiandi flashed her a smile. “You know the reason.”

The crane, occupying two seats, looked at the pair. Ji Ting had seen this thing preening from a distance before and couldn’t understand why the Star Point Sect would take a beast as a disciple.

Mei Chi was still talking to the Eldest Senior Sister. Ding Xiandi only caught the words “Fei Bing” (Flying Cake) and asked in disbelief, “Who gave her that name?”

“You did,” Mei Chi replied. She had entered the sect last and was a bit slow; she originally thought Ding Xiandi’s brain had stopped working due to heartbreak, but finding that she even forgot the Eldest Senior Sister, she said unhappily: “You told me this when I joined. You brought Eldest Senior Sister back from the back mountain, and you’re the one who hung the flatbread on her.”

Ding Xiandi was speechless, almost breaking into a cold sweat. Her transmigration was different from You Fuling’s; the latter at least had a buffer period and the memories of this body’s past. A month had passed, and Ding Xiandi still remembered nothing.

The fat crane who had pecked her looked at Ding Xiandi. Mei Chi continued her explanation: “The one wearing the veil is the person Second Senior Sister actually likes. But her Eldest Senior Sister looks down on Second Senior Sister and even wants to kill her.”

“Hey!” Ji Ting interjected. “When did I ever want to kill your Second Senior Sister!”

She realized that this sect’s talent for twisting the truth was hereditary. The second disciple spread rumors, the third disciple framed people to their faces, and the first disciple…

Was very aggressive. As a claw came down, the ground beneath Ji Ting’s feet sank several inches. Such a creature could give a cultivator a headache even without formal training, let alone the fact that she could command the Law Enforcement Cranes. Ji Ting had wanted to ask for a long time: do the Academy masters not care? If the Star Point Sect ever rebelled, the Tianji Academy would fall easily!

Others also realized why the Star Point Sect could act so boldly—it was essentially like the patrol guards were all their people. The recent flurry of “crane-delivered love letters” had also benefited the Star Point Sect; all the spirit stones and elixirs people gave to the cranes likely ended up in their hands.

The snowy crane tilted its head, staring at You Fuling, who was locked in a gaze with Ding Xiandi. Mei Chi patted the crane’s beak. “Yes, she’s the one she likes.”

Ding Xiandi really wanted to ask if the Eldest Senior Sister could speak, but fearing she’d say the wrong thing, she changed the subject: “What is Eldest Senior Sister doing here?”

Mei Chi shook her head. “Eldest Senior Sister prefers to be close to you, don’t you know that, Second Senior Sister?”

The sword cultivator with the swollen hand stared into the crimson eyes of the bird. She looked relaxed on the surface, but You Fuling could see her tension. Even if the method of cultivation had changed in this world, it didn’t mean there was no danger. You Fuling had spent years familiarizing herself with the rules and found it hard to just leave Ding Xiandi alone.

“I have something to say to you,” You Fuling said.

“To me?” Ji Ting asked.

“No.”

Ding Xiandi let out a long sigh of relief as she followed You Fuling out. The junior sister stayed behind to serve the giant bird, while Ji Ting glared at Ding Xiandi twice as she left.

Juan Yuanjia had accepted her punishment: a fine of thirty thousand spirit stones and a stint cleaning the Sword Tomb.

Ding Xiandi shrugged. “I’ve finally figured it out. Going to school here is no different from working a 9-to-5.”

Occasional clouds drifted past them. Tianji Academy had no high mountains, so even these clouds were artificially created with runes.

A fellow disciple had just passed them, his legs seemingly injured and replaced with metallic ones. He bolted five miles ahead right in front of Ding Xiandi, followed immediately by the blaring external warning of his Tianji Command: “Prosthetic severely damaged! Please replace! Please replace!”

There were plenty of people at Tianji Academy missing limbs. Ding Xiandi had been in the Sword Department for half a month; the classmate she sparred with yesterday had hands made of iron. Catching a blade barehanded was no problem for him, but his cultivation wasn’t anything special. Ding Xiandi had earned a hundred spirit stones just by descaling his iron hands.

Sitting beside her, You Fuling gazed at the island’s boundary line beyond the clouds, her tone flat. “You’ve worked a job before?”

“I spent a few days gaining experience at my mom’s company,” Ding Xiandi replied.

She had accepted long ago that her life had no other path. Unlike some peers who chased freedom, she knew that everything she received required a return on investment.

Ding Xiandi didn’t ask You Fuling the same; she knew all about You Fuling’s shut-in lifestyle. “This world is good, right? You’re very powerful here.”

Her usual small talk with others rarely worked on You Fuling. Ding Xiandi was trying to gauge if the other girl actually hated her. It would be normal if she did. They had been compared for years, and while the gossip of others was hard to block out, Ding Xiandi had always been the winner on the surface.

The new transmigrator lowered her head. The wind caught her messy hairband, and the patches on her sleeves looked painfully obvious to You Fuling. Ordinary sword cultivators usually had several sets of school uniforms, switching them out after they were damaged in class sparring. Even former rogue cultivators tended to care about their appearance.

You Fuling didn’t care about the previous Ding Xiandi of this world, but she felt a strange pang of sadness over these patched sleeves. “Can’t you change your clothes?”

“Huh?” Ding Xiandi waved her hand, her fingers brushing over the crooked stitching. “Is it that ugly? I sewed these patches on myself.” She pointed at a row of stitches that looked like a centipede, sounding almost proud. “It’s a new trend I’m starting. You just don’t get it.”

You Fuling was speechless and looked away toward a passing crane.

Finding no joy in teasing her further, Ding Xiandi switched to a more casual question. “What do you want to do most now that you’re here?”

Even though her veil had been half-pulled off before, You Fuling still preferred wearing it outdoors. In this world, there might be mystical reasons for it, but Ding Xiandi was reminded of how her friends back home would mention You Fuling wearing masks to school, wondering if she had “grown up ugly.”

Ding Xiandi thought: What a habit.

The veils in this cultivation world were much prettier than surgical masks. As a gust of wind blew the silk aside, Ding Xiandi caught a glimpse of a pale chin. Her face was too small, and she was still as thin as ever. Even though she was tall, she gave off a frail vibe, like she might blow away.

“I don’t know,” You Fuling replied.

“How is your health? I heard people say…” Ding Xiandi didn’t have any other friends with congenital defects like You Fuling. Even if she didn’t get along with someone, she would maintain the relationship as her parents required, but she knew that meant she had no real friends.

“I won’t live long,” You Fuling said, her voice both certain and ethereal.

Ding Xiandi laughed. “I wouldn’t be so sure. A girl in my department talks about ‘the weakness of the flesh’ all day. She wants to replace every part of her body with machinery to become…” Ding Xiandi hissed through her teeth. “What was that movie again?”

“Iron Woman,” You Fuling provided.

Have you actually seen that movie? Ding Xiandi wondered. She realized the girl could play along with a joke occasionally, but she definitely wasn’t “normal.”

“What about you?” Ding Xiandi asked.

In the past, You Fuling lived for her mother. In this world, she had no parents at all and no idea what she was living for. If Ding Xiandi hadn’t shown up, she didn’t know how she would have spent the rest of her life.

From their high vantage point, Tianji Academy looked like a giant Taiji diagram. The various cultivation sects were distributed on both sides like the four symbols of duality. The Sword Department was an outlier, which some interpreted as a sign of its unique status.

Ding Xiandi didn’t care about the symbolism. Her answer was decisive. “I want to go back.”

You Fuling didn’t seem surprised. “You did have a good life over there.”

Ding Xiandi shook her head. “It’s not that. This place is actually pretty fun. I even have a sister now.”

Her parents hadn’t married for love, but they agreed on one thing: whether the child was a boy or a girl, there would be only one heir. If anything happened to Ding Xiandi, the family business would go to the collateral branches.

Despite the massive drop in beauty and status after transmigrating, Ding Xiandi wasn’t upset. She knew that high status came with heavy pressure; no one was truly happy.

Mei Chi seemed a bit dim-witted, and even though You Fuling had only seen her a few times, she had heard of the girl’s reputation as a glutton. She looked at Ding Xiandi with surprise, not expecting her to actually like having such a sister.

“Why go back then?” You Fuling asked.

The trial hall sat at the mountain peak where the wind was fierce. When they first arrived, the transmigrators didn’t know how to bind their hair, but after a month, their grooming had improved significantly. Even without fine silk or expensive jewelry, Ding Xiandi still had a trace of her old vanity and tried to maintain what was left of her image.

“Before the car accident, I promised my mom we’d go on a trip during the holidays. Her new boyfriend is totally unreliable; I need to keep an eye on her.”

Her mother was much more formidable than You Fuling’s. You Fuling said bluntly, “That’s an excuse.”

“Fine. This face doesn’t even have a tenth of my original beauty. I can’t accept it.” Ding Xiandi reached out and poked You Fuling’s cheek through the veil. “Why do you get to keep your original face?”

You Fuling instinctively grabbed her finger. The look she gave her wasn’t hateful at first glance, but it confirmed to Ding Xiandi that You Fuling was still rejecting her.

Stopping her teasing, Ding Xiandi turned serious. “You didn’t have much of a role in the book, so maybe you can live a good life in this world. I’m different.”

She plucked a loose thread from her sleeve and blew it away. The thread quickly vanished. She felt like that floating thread—unwilling to accept a predetermined fate, yet unable to let go of her family.

“Just take what I said before as a joke. I’ll handle things myself.”

She couldn’t bring herself to force You Fuling. They weren’t close before; the idea of two “fellow countrymen” meeting and crying in each other’s arms was impossible for them. They were essentially rivals; if it weren’t for the accident, they might have spent their whole lives entangled in family feuds.

Suddenly, Ding Xiandi’s wrist was seized. The veiled girl didn’t look at her. “Then who do you plan to become Dao companions with to escape your fate?”

The lowly transmigrator didn’t realize that the thread she had blown away was now clenched in You Fuling’s other hand.

You Fuling asked again, “Are you going to give up and stay with Ming Jing, or…”

Ding Xiandi was still Ding Xiandi—she thrived in any world, and even in poverty, her light was hard to hide. You Fuling remembered seeing her laughing with friends in the past, accustomed to holding hands and hugging. On the sports field, she ran like the wind, the baseball she hit feeling like it had smashed right into You Fuling’s tightly guarded heart.

Unable to hide the bitterness and jealousy in her chest, You Fuling asked word by word: “Are you going to marry that underaged, gluttonous little junior sister of yours?”

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